U.S. President Donald Trump trashed the Iran nuclear deal at the UN last week, sparking speculation about whether he intends to pull the U.S. out of the deal before a key deadline by mid-October. … [Read more...]

The Pentagon is moving forward with plans to protect its bases and operations from rising seas and other impacts of climate change, despite an order by President Trump to halt climate planning. … [Read more...]

Q: What does spending tens of millions of dollars supporting climate denial organizations over a twenty year period buy you?
A: Donald Trump, abdication of U.S. leadership on climate and increased risk of damage from climate change. … [Read more...]

This summer was anything but quiet for climate policy.
In June, President Trump announced that the U.S. would withdraw from the Paris climate agreement.
In July, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit blocked Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Scott Pruitt's attempt to suspend protections from climate-destabilizing oil and gas pollution, calling the move “unauthorized” and “unreasonable.” … [Read more...]

The Trump administration proposed regulations to expedite the permitting process for natural gas exports from “small-scale” facilities on the Friday before Labor Day.
The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) had proposed an alteration of the rules for the export of “small-scale” liquefied natural gas (LNG) under the Natural Gas Act. The proposal will now be open to a public commenting period set to end October 16. … [Read more...]

The oblivious president.
On Tuesday, August 29, as Hurricane Harvey lingered over Houston dumping an “unprecedented” four feet of rain, plus a few inches, the presidential entourage landed in Corpus Christi. Three days earlier Hurricane Harvey came ashore north of Corpus, pounding the small community of Rockport as a Category 4 storm. … [Read more...]

Since the oil crises of the 1970s, every U.S. president has in some form or another proclaimed “energy independence” as a goal of American energy policy. The policy aimed to reduce dependency on foreign oil following the gasoline rationing, long lines at the pump and spiking prices that resulted from the 1973-74 oil embargo and the 1979 Iranian revolution. … [Read more...]

Energy Transfer Partners, owner of the Dakota Access pipeline, has filed a $300 million Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) lawsuit against Greenpeace and other environmental groups for their activism against the long-contested North Dakota-to-Illinois project. … [Read more...]

R. Shane Johnson recently briefed representatives of the U.S. nuclear power industry about the the strategies and programs that the Department of Energy (DOE) is developing to implement the Trump Administration’s vision for nuclear energy. … [Read more...]

A scientific report done every four years has been thrust into the spotlight because its findings directly contradict statements from the president and various Cabinet officials.
If the Trump administration chooses to reject the pending national Climate Science Special Report, it would be more damaging than pulling the United States out of the Paris Climate Agreement. Full stop. … [Read more...]

The Secretary issued a memo on April 14 of this year, with a missed completion deadline of five weeks ago, and a set of premises most industry observers found either troublesome or laughable. It’s not worth quoting in full but the wording strongly implied that the purpose of the study was to prove that renewable electricity projects endangered grid stability, and that the solution was more baseload coal and nuclear power plants, not fewer. … [Read more...]

I had an interesting email inquiry from a reader over the weekend. I don't know if he'd want to be identified by his full name, so let's just refer to him as Sergio. The email poses an interesting question that has not received much, if any, public discussion, so I decided to address it here. … [Read more...]